Limerence
by hadaka
Summary: Karin doesn't know what she's getting into. Karin/fem!Sena, 30 Moments.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** Do. Not. Own.

**Warnings:** Fem!Sena.

**Additionally:** Based on the 30 Moments Themes from the 30_moments lj. Not official, not posted there.

Pairing is Karin/fem!Sena.

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**1. bending the rules**

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When Koizumi Karin applied to Enma University, her mother fainted and her father didn't speak to her for a month.

"But, Karin," said her mother later, when she'd regained consciousness, "what about Saikyoudai? What about your year in Paris? Your art degree?"

These were all valid concerns. Saikyoudai's liberal arts program was an entirely different level from Enma's, and internationally renowned. They'd offered her a full scholarship, based on her record at Teikoku Private Senior High School, and the art director at Saikyoudai had all but promised her a spot in their exchange program with the University Paris-Sorbonne.

For the Karin of three years ago, the Karin who had applied at Teikoku with her dream of being an artist a shining thing in her eyes, Saikyoudai would have been the fulfillment of all her wishes, of every prayer she had ever sent up at the beginning of every exam.

For the Karin of three years ago.

"I have a scholarship to Enma, too," she offered her mother; a shabby offering, the poor man's consolation prize.

"A _sports_ _scholarship_," wailed her mother, hands on her face. "For _football_."

And Karin didn't know why, but her heart was racing.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** Do. Not. Own.

**Warnings:** Fem!Sena.

**Additionally:** Based on the 30 Moments Themes from the 30_moments lj. Not official, not posted there.

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**2. breakfast nook**

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She put off finding a place to live as late as she could.

Suzuna was surprisingly unsurprised when Karin called her and asked if she knew anyone who was going to attend Enma and needed a roommate.

_"Well, yes, actually,"_ said Suzuna. _"But I thought your parents lived nearby?"_

"Yes," said Karin, "but...but I thought I'd try being on my own. You know? Only, I don't really want to live all by myself. So..."

She was blushing. Sitting alone in her room, half-filled boxes all around her, and she was blushing because it had been Taka who had told her that he'd heard from Monta that Suzuna had been talking about how Sena had asked Suzuna for help finding an apartment, and to see if she knew of anyone who wanted to share expenses.

Karin wondered if she sounded as obvious as she felt.

_"Okay,"_ said Suzuna, like she hadn't noticed anything, _"so I'll text you Sena's e-mail?"_


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer:** Do. Not. Own.

**Warnings:** Fem!Sena.

**Additionally:** Based on the 30 Moments Themes from the 30_moments lj. Not official, not posted there.

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**3. lighting the way**

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At the last minute, Karin decided to go and meet Sena at the airport, and she was standing there, at the waiting area for arrivals and more nervous than she'd been at any snap of the ball, when someone called her name and she looked up from checking her texts to see a woman smiling at her from the open gate.

_"Koizumi-san!"_

She didn't recognize the woman. Shorter than her, with a head of shoulder-cut, unrestrained dark hair. Dark, dark eyes. Looking tired from the twenty-hour flight, but still immaculate in a black military jacket, skinny jeans, and ankle boots Karin herself would have died for.

"Koizumi-san!"

When the woman walked toward her, people turned to watch her as she passed.

Karin's heart was pounding. She opened her mouth to say _Excuse me?_ and the words caught in her throat. She kept thinking, _Who is this woman?_, except there was something familiar about the way she moved, the way she turned to avoid passing people and carts, as though if Karin were to remove a few inches of height and shorten the hair and exchange the Burberry for a private school uniform and somehow pull a layer of uncertain potential over the inevitable fulfillment of that face—

_Ah,_ some part of Karin was whispering, that same part that had so calmly filled out the application for Enma. _Ah._

"Koizumi-san," the woman said as she reached Karin, her face flushed with pleasure, "you didn't have to come all the way here! I thought we were going to meet at Enma? We're just on our way—"

And through all of her turmoil, through all the disorder and breathlessness and this strange sensation of falling that was overwhelming her as she looked at Kobayakawa Sena for the first time in a year, Karin managed to stammer, "Ah—w-we?"

The large hand that appeared on Sena's shoulder seemed to silence all of Karin's confusions at once. People stared and pointed.

"So," said Donald Oberman, "you're Karin?"


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** Do. Not. Own.

**Warnings:** Fem!Sena.

**Additionally:** Based on the 30 Moments Themes from the 30_moments lj. Not official, not posted there.

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**4. larger than life**

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There were three of them: Don, and two more, a blonde named Clifford Louis and a black man named Patrick Spencer who told her to call him _Panther_, as everyone did. They looked at her with eyes like gauges, taking the measure of her in a frank and point-blank manner that would have taken even Taka aback. Karin flushed, but held her ground, and wondered, at the smile that Panther-san gave her, exactly what they'd been told about her.

Her thoughts whirled as she tried to understand what they were doing here.

"We're going straight to Enma," said Panther. His expression was warm and friendly, which made Karin like him a little more then and there. "We want to see the teams."

"And we want them to see _us_," said Clifford, and Karin couldn't help but think of another blonde, another sharp, predatory smile.

"Let's go together, Koizumi-san," said Sena. Her dark eyes were lit as if by electric arcs, like Sena was not made up of flesh and blood like normal people, but ribbons of light. "I want to see everyone right away!"

"Oh, yes," said Don, "say you will, _Koizumi-san_."

Karin glanced at him, eyes wide.

Don was looking straight at her, a hint of something like amusement to those edged, bored eyes, as if he'd figured her out the second he'd seen her, and it made Karin go cold with dread to think about what those cruel eyes had perceived in the way she'd looked at Sena.

"Y-yes," said Karin to Sena, but her eyes were on Don. "Yes, of course."

Don's lips curved in something not quite a smile.

When they turned to leave the airport, their luggage having been sent on ahead of them, Don's hand seemed to fit naturally and easily in the small of Sena's back. Sena had no reaction to it, continuing to talk casually to Karin about how long the flight had been, how much turbulence they'd had, the flight attendant who had flirted scandalously with Panther, and how much she looked forward to seeing all of their friends.

Karin tried to listen, but all she seemed able to see was Don's hand at Sena's back, and nausea made her keep her mouth tightly shut and nod along.


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer:** Do. Not. Own.

**Warnings:** Fem!Sena.

**Additionally:** Based on the 30 Moments Themes from the 30_moments lj. Not official, not posted there.

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**5. count your blessings**

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"Oh no," said Sena, "I'm only attending Enma for one year. Then I'll go back to the States. I intend to graduate from Notre Dame."

She said it so easily, so coolly.

"We are here on an invitation from Enma," said Panther. "They couldn't send us one fast enough when Clifford made the suggestion."

They were in a private car. There were two, because no Japanese car could possibly have fit both Panther and Don into the same small space, and Don and Clifford were in the other car, ahead of them in the traffic. Sena sat between Karin and Panther, and showed no discomfort at the way her hip pressed against Panther's.

It had been Don who had suggested that Sena go with Karin.

_To catch up,_ he'd said.

Karin was still trying to make everything make _sense_. "But, Notre Dame University? I thought...didn't you go to Notre Dame High School? And...and how did you meet?"

"Oh, that was all Clifford's fault," said Sena. "He brought Don to one of my games. Then Don invited me to the university. He did the same thing for Panther."

"He negotiated with Morgan to have my contract deferred until I graduate," said Panther. "And he got me a full scholarship to Notre Dame. My grandmother always wanted me to go to college, so..." He lifted a shoulder.

Karin tried to keep the distress out of her face, her voice. "But only one year at Enma?"

"Oh," said Sena, and her eyes were indecipherable.

"It's because she told her friend Monta they'd play together in college," said Panther. "She wouldn't break her promise, even though Don pressured her for months. But Don said he wasn't going to wait another year to play together, so he had Clifford arrange everything."

"This is our compromise," said Sena. "One year at Enma, and then back to Notre Dame. I really couldn't ask any more."

They both smiled at Karin as if they'd explained everything, told her everything she needed to know to comprehend the situation. Karin stared back at them.

_But what is he to you,_ Karin wanted to cry, _that you have to compromise? That you have to ask for things? What is he that he can make these decisions?_

Yet something kept her quiet, something made her hesitate, and maybe it was Sena's quiet look, maybe Panther's warning glance, or maybe it was even Don himself, Don and his cold, bored eyes.


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer:** Do. Not. Own.

**Warnings:** Fem!Sena.

**Additionally:** Based on the 30 Moments Themes from the 30_moments lj. Not official, not posted there.

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**6. roleplay**

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Karin didn't realize that no one else had known that Sena was not returning alone until it was too late to warn anyone.

When Sena and Karin stepped around the corner and in full view of Enma's football field, and all the people who filled its stands, at first no one noticed them.

"Uwaaa," breathed Sena. "_Everyone's_ here. Look, there's Shin-san—and Hiruma-san, and Musashi-san, and Jyuumonji-kun, and, and—oh, oh, it's Yamato-san—"

Sena moved up to the edge of the pavement they were on, to get a better look. Karin hung back, glancing behind them for the others.

When Sena spoke, her voice was strangely—so strangely—almost wistful. "No one's changed at all."

Karin inhaled sharply, almost wanted to cry, because _no, no, some of us have, some of us_, but then, from below, on the field, came a loud, disbelieving shout of _Sena?_

A breeze lifted the hair from Sena's shoulders. Her back was as straight and poised as an upright blade.

For a single heartbeat, Karin thought the whole world had gone silent.

_"Montaaa,"_ called Sena. She was smiling, smiling so happily. _"Rikuuu!"_

Karin looked at Sena, looked at this dark-haired, dark-eyed woman standing before her, the fall wind in her hair, and what she saw made the breath catch in her throat.

No one spoke. The entire field was quiet.

Sena was asking "Eh? What's wrong?" when Karin felt someone walk by her.

"Huh," said Don, where he stopped beside Sena, "so this is Enma?" His eyes swept the field, taking in the players, the stands, the uniforms, and the nearby sports complex. "It makes me sad."

"Don't pull that now," said Clifford, moving up on the other side of Sena. He dismissed the assembled teams with a single disdainful glance. "You're the one who wanted to come."

"HEEEY," shouted Panther, raising both arms in the air and nearly cuffing Clifford on the head. "'SUP, TEAM JAPAN! USA IN THE HOUSE!"

They all stood in front of Karin, their backs to her, and this for some reason, in some way, made her angry. She moved without thinking, walking up to take her place between Clifford and Sena, and she ignored the way both Don and Clifford looked at her from the corners of their eyes.

At Sena's side, Karin had a very good view of the expressions on Takeru's and Taka's faces.

She stood straight and tall and as if she had every right to be there.

_"Kurita-saaan,"_ called Sena, _"here we are!"_


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer:** Do. Not. Own.

**Warnings:** Fem!Sena.

**Additionally:** Based on the 30 Moments Themes from the 30_moments lj. Not official, not posted there.

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**7. fight or flight  
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"Tell the butterball to call me when they play someone interesting," said Don, and turned to walk away.

Karin was vaguely aware of Clifford's voice lifting into the air as he called down the hill, of how both he and Panther immediately followed Don, like bodyguards or retainers. She felt him passing her as if he were a lodestone and they but fragments of iron pulled in his wake. Don paid no attention to the silence or the stares—he moved as if he inhabited his own slice of the universe, as if he exerted his own gravity on the things and space around him and nothing else mattered even enough to notice.

Except.

As Don passed Sena, his hand went out.

To the small of her back.

"I want to see these apartments," he said.

Karin was an experienced QB, and an artist. She was intimately familiar with every movement and muscle of the human arm, of every way in which it could reasonably bend or flex or motion, and of some ways in which it could not. She was watching Don's arm now, a huge, menacing thing of muscle and bone and grasping intent.

And she saw, very clearly, how Don didn't even need to _touch_ Sena for her to turn to him and be pulled into the curve of that hungry arm.

"Of course," said Sena. She didn't even look back at the field, at the bench where the team was gathered.

But her eyes flicked to Karin. "Coming, Koizumi-san?"

They looked at her. _All_ of them—Don, Clifford, Panther. The other Enma football players. All the spectators, gathered on the hill. Takeru and Taka, sitting with the rest of their lineup from Saikyoudai.

Sena.

Some part of Karin trembled under those eyes. Some part of Karin recognized this for what it was: the past behind her, all of her old friends and new opponents and the safety of the regular bench, and, in front of her, something that was neither present nor past but couldn't possibly be the future—four of the most naturally talented football players in the world, world-class athletes all, looking at her as if waiting for her to make a decision.

Some part of Karin shook under the weight of those eyes, and wanted nothing more than to run away now and save herself.

The rest of her couldn't take her eyes off of Sena.

"Of course," said Karin, and followed the four of them into the quad, leaving behind them that awful silence.


End file.
